Rain in the Night
by g21lto
Summary: A preHBP look at the night Tom Marvolo Riddle confronts, and kills, his father's family. In postHBP canon, an AU fic.
1. The Storm

Official Disclaimer: I own nothing.  Nada.  Not even the (nonexistent!) church.  J. K. Rowling, the second wealthiest woman in Great Britain who should be the actual wealthiest (come on, folks: Madonna, J. K. Rowling; "Material Girl," Harry Potter.  Maybe OoP will make them even), owns all the characters, all the places, and all the spells.  Don't sue me!  

"Rain in the Night"

I cannot decide whether or not this evening should be so beautiful.  At any rate, it _is.  Tonight's sunset isn't classically spectacular; there are too many clouds to the west for that.  The sky merely fades from the blue of day to white to pink, then, low to the horizon, purplish dark.  As I stand watching, the swollen red sun sinks into the dark.  Still, there's wind, slight but present, and smelling of freshly turned earth—I hear it moving the trees in the forest behind me, like the murmuring of spirits.  I hear occasional birdsong. _

I'm going to kill a man tonight. 

No, no: it's all wrong.  This evening is too soothing, too peaceful.  As if the weather can ever really be _wrong; weather is one of those factors which are uncontrollable.  There's nothing wrong with tonight, any more than there was anything wrong with the day before yesterday.  I'm expecting perfection, and nature will never conform (I know this).  _

Tonight _will_ be perfect.  It will be beautiful, so I suppose the sunset _is_ somewhat fitting.

It would be erroneous to say I've waited a long time for this night.  I've waited forever.  I've waited for more than time, from since before I became conscious of the ticking of the clock and the passing of days; I've waited since before I was born through my mother and through the blood in her veins.  I've waited since before I even knew I _was_ waiting (I know this also).

With every step I take I feel the power coursing in me, power that connects me to the ground I'm walking on and the air I'm breathing, because I wield the supreme power of nature: death.  I am light, smooth as water yet walking on air.

To put it in words my schoolmates would understand, you don't want any of this.  Don't fuck with me.  

Profanity: I put myself to shame.  Sometimes I suppose it's simply necessary to stoop to the common speech, though, so soothing to belt out the word and feel it on your lips and have it out in the open.  Or maybe I just enjoyed the stricken looks on their faces.  Even I'm not above that, I'll be the first to admit.

I'm standing in a graveyard right now.  I didn't plan it this way, of course; there was no way I could have known whether the bastard lived near a graveyard or not.  It seems to be a private cemetery, a family one I mean.  There's no church nearby.  It's rained here recently; I can tell from the mud that coats my shoes whenever I walk across the relatively fresh graves nearer the house.  It hasn't rained in the past two days.  Though if that cloud bank to the west gets any darker it may rain soon.  _That would be fitting weather.  Perhaps a storm.  A flash of lightning illuminates the looming figure—_

Silly.  I'm being a child.

I'll never be a child again, not after tonight.  I realize this, and I embrace it (was I ever really a child?).  I'm resting my hand on an old gravestone, cracked and weather-pitted with moss growing over top the face with lettering.  It is illegible; it is falling apart.  I remove my hand and walk on, the dusk breeze growing stiffer.

Any person who has looked a man in the eyes and struck him dead is no longer a child.  And that's what I'm going to do, now, tonight.  Soon.  So soon, and I tremble with anticipation, my lips forming the words that will kill him.  He lives there.  In that house up there, on the hill, that large and beautiful house with five servants and a cook who will tell you most any odd thing you want to know provided you keep the sherry coming.  Dear soul, I do hope she will be able to find employment after tonight.  She has been most helpful, Muggle though she is.  I didn't even have to resort to magic.  Except for the Polyjuice Potion necessary to disguise myself, of course.  I don't need any ambitious Ministry worker connecting the dots and showing up in my school dormitory.

I'm not in disguise now.  He will look into my eyes.  He will see _me_.  I wonder what he will think of what he sees.  I don't cut a very intimidating figure.  Physically, I mean.  I am tall but very thin; some find my dark hair and fair skin unsettling but still others find it another trait to be ridiculed.  I almost wish he ridicules me, just so I have even more reason to make him afraid, to murder him and laugh.  Look here, Riddle: laugh if you want, laugh at this skinny, pale teenager who threatens you.

You'll regret it.  Will he look like me?

New line of sight: away from the house, back toward the dark forest that laps at the graveyard's edges.  I do recognize the irony, you understand; I do realize how close I am traversing to foolishness by loitering in a cemetery before I kill him.  How was I to know whether the bastard lived next to a graveyard or not?  How was I even to know where he lived?  It took me four whole years to find the bastard.  He hides well, even when he's not hiding from anything.  I smirk.  I wonder if he even knows I exist.  I wonder if it will mean anything to him.  I wonder—

The cry of a bird, from over my left shoulder.  If it's a raven I'm going to hex myself.  How was I to know the bastard lived next to a graveyard?  Damn him.  I'm suffocating.  I am light.  I am light—

Lord Voldemort strikes again, right?  He skulks the graveyard and ponders the mystic meaning in the setting sun; he calls his father a bastard and grinds his teeth at the fine old house up on the hill.  He kicks a tombstone, how cunning!  And then to avenge his aching toe he blasts the grave marker into a million pieces!  No, it's all wrong; the spell didn't hit right.  Half the stone is still left sticking out of the ground; I'm losing my focus, the pitch of the spell as it traversed the air, it was too low, no, no, all wrong.  I can't breathe.  I can't move.  

—I can't be seen.  Only now does it occur to me the noise I have made; stupid, stupid!  Into the woods.  With a parting glance behind me, toward the old house framed in blood-red light, I move swiftly toward the forest.  Through gravestones.  This cemetery isn't well-kept; I am moving through weeds and tall grasses gone to seed with every step.  Few of the gravestones are even legible.  These Muggles don't even honor their dead.  I suppose they might not even care about the half-destroyed tombstone I have left…

I reach the perimeter of the gravestones, and turn back.  No one is coming to investigate.  I suppose that makes sense; it _is_ off-night for all the servants.  According to the cook, that is.  I shift my feet on the sandy dirt, straining, eyes searching the gathering darkness, the spirit-murmuring behind me even louder with proximity.  Except at this range it doesn't sound like murmuring.  It simply sounds like wind in the trees of a forest at dusk.  No one is coming.  Stupid Muggles—I shouldn't even have worried.  

Graveyards are commonly avoided by Muggles, you know.  They have a curious fear of them, as if the spirits of the dead reside where their bodies lie.  Which makes no sense, as even in Muggle stories a ghost always haunts away from the body, either in the place he died or in a place he knew well.  I got a lot of that indoctrination growing up in the orphanage—never disrespect a grave, never do anything joyful in a cemetery.  And never _ever_ go into a graveyard after dark!  Because then the witches will get you!  I always loved that part.  Supplied by the other boys, of course, never the nuns, because _magic doesn't exist.  After I was enrolled at Hogwarts, I always found such stories humorous.  How I wished to find a graveyard to haunt!  Just to prove them wrong.  And prove them right.  I just wanted to haunt something, to be the nightmare figure in someone's dreams for years to come._

I was a child then.  Eleven, even twelve.  Another shade of irony: Lord Voldemort, childhood far removed, haunts this dusk-stained graveyard years after his last Witches' Sabbath fantasy.  I chuckle.  With such a convenient private cemetery, I do wonder if the wizards in this vicinity would ever have gathered here…just to poke some good fun at the local Muggles (dancing on the graves, hah!  In which are probably the Riddles of bygone days).

—am I truly a child, then?  That all I can think of now are the silly fantasies of an eleven-year-old boy?  I'm going to kill a man tonight.  I wonder if my mother ever danced here.

Into the forest.  Already painted in shadows, trees cast red in the setting sun, knots staring down like eyes.  No.  And now I reach the height of foolishness, the height of stupidity, the pinnacle of childishness as I become afraid of the very elements I control!  For what, with my wand, can I not change and manipulate at my discretion?  For what object or creature can I not Transfigure?  What animal can I not kill?  What shadow can I not destroy with magic light?  None!  All!  Even a simple wizard is safe in a forest at night!

Idle thoughts, idle fantasies, a schoolboy on a lark!  Playing hero and villain with the world!  If my mother could see me now—if my grandfather—_his_ father—I am the living repository of the blood of Salazar Slytherin himself (you see, you are not dealing with a simple schoolboy after all).  I proved myself Slytherin's heir two years ago.

And now I am suffocating.  No, not suffocating, not anymore.  Free.  Free, but too free; movements so unrestricted that I lose my purchase, I claw upon the air.  Smooth as water, yes, but insubstantial as mist, and I know my powers are back; I feel the magic in me though such a feeling is impossible, I could obliterate a gravestone now so that not even _pieces remained and still I am insubstantial, clawing at running water passing me by, powerful, oh yes! but waving my wand at the universe, a child telling Time to stop his interminable march forward.  A warrior fighting off Death with a sword.  And this is somehow worse, far worse than suffocating like an imbecile because I _have_ the power, I feel it, I realize my potential, and all my cries of vengeance are so much Quixotic whining against nature and against her laws._

This is Lord Voldemort, the Heir of Slytherin, child with wand raised to the new-coming night; this is Lord Voldemort, this is Salazar's long-removed son, _this_, this schoolboy, cowering on the forest floor under tree knots which are transformed into the eyes of graveyard statues!  Graveyard statues, the graveyard outside our church-run orphanage, the one I entered at night once on a dare, the moonlight beaming down on marble and granite heads and eyes.  I wasn't there to win a bet.  Well, of course I was there to win a bet, but that wasn't the real reason I was there.  I was looking for my mother's grave.

I was seven years old at the time.  Another, different, child, shouting challenges and searching foolishly for what he knew he would never find.

My mother left me at an orphanage in Birmingham.  At age five the overcrowded Birmingham institution sent me to London.  My mother died in Birmingham.  But I was sure as hell going to find her grave in London.

Waving my wand at the night.  Telling Time to stop; telling Death to bend himself to me; telling Heredity to make herself untrue and purge my blood of her stain.  His stain.  Telling the weather to be perfect.  Telling Slytherin…what am I telling Slytherin?  Surprise, look who's coming to dinner?  Look at the Heir who is yours and whom fate chose to bestow your gift upon?  Look at the schoolboy, the silly child who sees the eyes of time in the knots of trees and hears spirits murmuring in the wind and gives himself the name Lord Voldemort, fancying himself a superhero (banish the Muggle thought) come to conquer the world?  Who envisions a perfect night on which to murder his father?

I chuckle, wondering vaguely if it is with madness that I laugh now.  I realize, I always have realized it: I put too much stock in mysticism.  Romanticism.  Yet there's a fine line between mystic coincidence and the circumstances of fate.

And I do expect fate to be on my side.  How could I not?  I am the Heir of Salazar Slytherin, not some simple schoolboy after all; fate foretold of and prepared for my coming.  No, I can't expect perfection of the weather tonight.  No, I cannot expect the wind to sound like spirits; no, I cannot expect…yet…anything of that magnitude.

It will come with time.  For I am Lord Voldemort.

I am going to kill a man tonight.  I'm going to kill him now.  There will be no _perfect time; I've put the deed off searching for that perfect moment, when the spirit-murmuring and blood-red sun and chilling breeze would all unite into one picture whose savage beauty would propel me on to my task.  I do not need it.  _

I need only my wand, which I twirl between two fingers, watching it emit some idling sparks in green and red; I need only my wand, and now I am up, and moving, glancing up into the trees whose knots are only knots, whose branches are only branches and whose density conceals a graveyard in which I am sure no witches ever danced.  The air is crisp, cold, the earlier breeze stiffening into a wind driving in the weather system to the west.  

I step out of the spirit-murmur lapping at the edges of the graveyard.  Cross sandy soil to the first gravestones, walk through.  Stones crumbling, stones already crumbled, one stone half-blasted away.  My eyes are fixed on the house.  I wonder if my mother ever danced—

I pause, almost curse, but no need.  Pants only snagged on a briar bush.  Forward again.  Mud now, I have reached the newer graves; a quick charm has me through it without a problem and I am on the lawn now, on the lawn of the house, walking up the sloping hill, wand out and swinging jovially at my side, hello father, were you expecting me?  I want to laugh, but something within me cautions of a grave moment, inappropriate for mirth.  Then I do laugh, because what is holding me back?  I am Lord Voldemort.  I am light, smooth as water yet walking on air.  

I've reached the shadow of the house.  The air is suddenly much colder—I laugh softly, enjoying Nature's accommodation of me.  Small trees here and there; well-kept gardens with flowers whose perfume makes my nose wrinkle.  Too sweet.  But then my tastes tend to run morbid.  The lush green grass now looks gray under my feet, sicklied over by the wan and reddish light.  I see a back door.

So easy, all so easy; these Muggles must live without fear of robbery.  Of course the door will be locked, but there is no Muggle lock in existence which _alohomora cannot open on the first try.  But I will not need _alohomora_.  Because I am going to the front door.  _

I begin around the house, stepping out of the mansion's shadow into the sunlight.  The sun is shining directly in my face now, my eyes squinting and searching for a servant or two on the loose.  I twirl my wand.  It emits sparks, hot-white and momentarily as blinding as the sun.  I smile.

And I reach the front of the house, see the wide and spacious front porch; wicker chairs on either side of a stained oak door with a darker wood handle, all very elegant set against the white of the porch and house front.  Green shutters.  I pause for a moment to marvel at the irony, then I am on the front step, then I am on the porch, then I am stopping before the door, then I am putting my wand away.

For now.  

If I were to follow the conventions of father-son meetings, I would take a deep breath at this point and straighten my hair and clothing.  I smirk.  Then I reach out a hand, fingers tingling slightly with anticipation, and take hold of an ornate brass knocker.  I let it fall.  Once.  Twice.  That should be enough.  He will have heard me.  

I step back and wait.  I hear nothing for a few moments, except for the breeze blowing around the sides of the house.  

I bite my lip, then immediately release my grip.  There's no need for nervousness.  The occupants are in, the servants are out; I have it all from the cook.  The sherry-loving cook who was on her third by this point.  I bite my lip, then force myself to relax again.

The wind picks up in a momentary gust, chilling the back of my neck and making me shiver.  I pull my arms around me in a sort of hug, hunkered against the cold; no one is coming to the door.  He isn't home, or he isn't answering; damn the cook and her sherries.  

But there's nowhere for me to go now—where, into the village to stay the night in the pub?  Stretched out on a no-doubt filthy bed in a Muggle's house?  

The wind lifts for just a second, gusts again, lifts; I concentrate on the sound of it, the rise and fall, concentrate so that I almost do not hear the sound of the door.  A clicking sound, like someone undoing an inside lock.  I freeze.  The turning of the doorknob.  I snap my head to the front in time to see the door open, in time to see her step out of it.  Not my father.  A woman, around fifty by her body and wrinkled hands but with a face that could be years younger.  Rosy-cheeked with delicately sculpted features, long graying blonde hair and a mouth that seems designed to be slightly open in a look of mild surprise.  I look into her face, and in her eyes I see reflected the blood-red setting sun.


	2. The Rain

She seems surprised.  Then her eyes narrow almost imperceptibly.

"We're not buying anything, young man."  Her voice though not sharp has a scolding quality to it.  I'm a little surprised, but not much.  It never occurred to me that they would think me a common peddler.  But the cook can wax philosophical on the rigors of being in the Riddles' employ.  So I am prepared.

"That's convenient, ma'am.  I'm not selling."  I'm still looking into her eyes, which are still red-orange from the sky behind me.

"What is your business?"  The wind gusts again, blowing her hair back and rippling my shirtsleeves uncomfortably.

I smile.  "Family business."

She cocks an eyebrow at me, not entirely hostile, yet shrewd.  Even…challenging.  

"What is your name?"

"L—" I look into her eyes and revise my strategy.  Something tells me that dropping the name "Lord Voldemort" here will do me no good.  "Tom."

The eyebrow inches higher.  I'm beginning to consider pulling out my wand again.  More wind, another once-over from eyes that now change from red-orange to deep brown with their movement.

"Come in."  

I blink, not quite believing how easily I have gained entry.

"Do you wish to stay in the cold, Tom?  Come in."  And she steps back, motioning me inside.  I follow, vaguely suspicious but unworried.  These are only Muggles, after all; they cannot pose any real threat.  Still, I cannot believe an obviously wealthy family like the Riddles would take in any stranger off the street.  The woman, who I know must be my father's mother, offers no explanation.  She merely looks me over, purses her lips, and leads the way further into the house.  I offer no facial expression in return.  I owe her nothing.  

As we walk along the hallway, I try not to let my eyes wander.  Wealth.  Yes, this family has money; the décor here is no more impressive than the décor at Hogwarts, though.  But somehow the money needed, the money hoarded, to furnish this house hits home to me now.  

Anger.  But I keep it in check.  Soon.  So soon, and I tremble (but not really)…

As my father's mother walks ahead of me I realize she has a slight limp.  She favors her left side.  But she walks forward, erect; I'm beginning to find her slight swaying unsettling.  She pauses outside a frosted glass door and pushes it open by a silver handle.  Whoever heard of a door this ornate _inside_?  It serves no purpose.  I would not waste wealth on such trinkets.

The door opens and I am admitted.  Now there are two new people to occupy my attention, and with some relief I focus my eyes away from the old woman (she did, after all, think me a common peddler).  There is a peculiar tense, thick and cold feeling in my mouth—like the after-effects of nausea.  Two men.  The one on my right is silver-haired and silver-bearded, plump, wearing an expression of old-money snobbery as he looks me over.  He sits on a plush and expensive chair.  I look into his eyes, unblinking, until he drops his gaze to his empty lap.  And then…I taste bitterness as slowly so slowly I turn to look at the man on my left.

"Tom, state your business," says the woman brusquely from my right shoulder.  I look back at her.

"My business is with Tom Riddle."  I point to my left, hoping my finger is somewhat accurate.  

"Who the devil are you?  I've never seen him before in my life!"  I sense that the last was for his parents' benefit, not mine.

"This is a private residence, young man.  We can't have the whole county come gallivanting in at all hours!"  I regard the old man coolly, letting him finish his rant.  He looks into my eyes, then down again at his lap (the eyes of Lord Voldemort are cold and indomitable).  "Ashley," he says, and shoots a nasty glance at his wife, "why'd you let him in?"

The old woman's face doesn't change, but there is a touch of impatience in her voice which I'm not sure is directed at me.  "You haven't stated your business, Tom."

"Hang on a moment," says Tom Riddle.  "What's his surname?"

"You've been asked a question."  

Her voice is like her face, too rounded off to be sharp and yet hard as stone.

"_I_ haven't."

"You're not here to play games, young man.  Answer the question."

I feel my mouth turn up in a smile.

"Riddle."

"Hang _on_," cries Tom Riddle.

"What is he on about?  Ashley, please escort Master…ah…_him_ to the door."  This whole family has the annoying habit of addressing each other instead of me.

"You say your name is…Tom Riddle?" says Tom Riddle, and finally and slowly I turn my head to see him, and the bitterness in my mouth redoubles.

He's redheaded.  I note this with some surprise; I have never before imagined my father with red hair.  His face is red too, and he has…freckles.  I almost laugh, but my inner gauge warns of a ruined moment.  His eyes are large and green and narrowed at me, his nose long and straight and wrinkled in thought.  He is thoroughly detestable.  I wonder if my mother ever danced with him.  I bite my lip and will myself to remain on task.  It occurs to me that Ashley Riddle hasn't yet escorted me to the door.  Or attempted to, at least.  She moves forward now, nearer the two men.

"Tom," she says suddenly, and both I and my father snap to.  I grit my teeth.  "Young man," she says, pointing at me, and I note with annoyance that her voice has taken on an imperious tone.  "Turn around for me."  I blink and she does not, still sticking me with her deep brown eyes.

Whatever this Muggle woman's game is, I'm not going to play.  I'm here for a purpose, and I'm not going to follow along like a child obeying Mummy.

"Turn around in a circle, now."  The childish part of my mind shouts a challenge, but I clamp down on it—she's a Muggle, and of no consequence.  She is my father's mother.  She's not blinking. 

I begin to wonder whether or not I appear childish now.  Her eyes flash brown fire, and I wonder how long we have been deadlocked like this; I note without moving my eyes from hers that the red sunlight on the far wall has mostly disappeared.  This serves no purpose.  I assume a mocking smile.

"As you wish, Mrs. Riddle," I say, and raise my hands in a placating gesture.

"You'd do well to treat my wife with more respect, boy," pipes the old man, red-faced by this point.  I note that his protestations are growing louder with each turn.

I smile again, and slowly turn on the spot, the room spinning full-circle around me; old woman, old man, young man (his youth surprises me), wall, window with blinding view of sun, wall, door.  Old woman, rounded features flattened; biting her lip, left middle finger resting lightly on her temple.  She looks at me with…resignation?

"Tom," she whispers, looking almost weak.  She shakes her head, lowers her hand, deep eyes hard again.  Her voice is strong again.  "Tom—you said nothing—_nothing about a pregnancy."  I want to blink, but I restrain myself as I meet her gaze.  The old woman's figured it out._

"What is this?" the old man shouts in my ear, and I can tell he's standing up by this point.  "Boy, I want you OUT of my house—now!"

A sharp intake of breath from behind me, from my father.  I turn to look at him, no longer smiling.  There's a look in his eyes like a trapped animal.  Surprised, yes, surprised to see me (surprised I'm still alive?).  Yes…but he knew.  A dagger of ice hits my stomach as I look into his eyes, and I know—he abandoned my mother in full knowledge of her pregnancy.  Of my existence.  

He knew.  I'd always suspected—always been nearly sure—now it's fact.  

I'm going to kill him tonight.  And I'm going to laugh (I wonder with what feeling he regards my mother and me?).  

"Who?" I hear my father's mother ask.

"Julia," says my father.  Julia.  Yes.  That was her name.

"That tramp?" interrupts the old man. "This boy is the son of—"

"John, don't speak ill of her in front of her son," says my father's mother, the sharpest I've heard her voice yet.

"Julia…" says my father in a whisper.  I look at him.  His eyes are still afraid, but there's a wonder in his eyes.  "Julia…she named you 'Tom'?"  He looks at me now, looks right at me for the first time.  His eyes meet mine.  Those cold green eyes.  I wonder what my mother saw in him.

"Tramp—running around town—causing problems—poor little beggar—and now HE shows up on our doorstep—"

"John!"

"She wanted his money, you see.  All she wanted.  Get herself pregnant, make him owe her something—stupid boy fell right into—"

There is a minor fight going on behind me.  Though I continue to watch my father, I listen.  His eyes are focused on the combatants.

"Good for nothing—poor girls—prostitutes—"

I grit my teeth and nearly reach for my wand.  But no—not quite yet.  My father jumps back as though slapped, but says nothing.  Interesting.  I wonder if he saw my reaction.

"John, her son—"

"Son of a bitch!" ("John!") "Just standing there—back to us—no respect—turn around and _look_ at me, boy—this is what happens, Ashley; this is what happens—"

She takes in a sharp breath, cutting him off momentarily.  I see my father lean forward with interest, and I wonder why.

"John," she says, quite firmly and loudly, "John—you will _sit down."_

"I will do _no_ such—"

"John!  Sit down!"

"I WILL NOT TAKE ORDERS FROM—"

"YES, YOU _WILL_!" she thunders suddenly behind me, and despite myself I take half a step forward and away from her.  I turn to watch her, interested.

"JOHN.  You will sit down NOW.  I will NOT stand for more of this insulting talk about our grandson's mother."  All smoothness is now gone from her face; all that remains is the hard marble I saw before.  And for it all I cannot help but think that now, in the height of her passion, she is unaccountably beautiful.  I glance behind me and see my father standing up now, his face shining with something that looks like triumph.  Interesting.

"I will NOT let you throw him out of our house," continues my grandmother in her terrible voice, and I turn back around to look at her. By now she has my grandfather completely cowed.  He is sitting in the chair again, looking at her with an expression of amazement.  And fear.  "We will LISTEN to him.  _Now_, Tom, how is dear Julia these days?"  Her voice is suddenly so very caring.

I blink, nearly shake my head but catch myself in time (Lord Voldemort is never caught unawares).  Out of the corner of my eye I see my father sit back down again, eyes on the floor.  I ignore him.  I look into her eyes, deep brown now, and laugh wryly.

"Dead," comes my short response, and I watch with amusement as she recoils.

"Dear," she whispers, finger to her temple again. "My dear…when is the funeral?"

The silence behind me is earsplitting.

"Seventeen years ago," I say, and without warning I feel the bitterness welling up, the same bitterness I taste when I look at him, the same bitterness I've held back for ten years.  "She died seventeen years ago, when I was born.  She died in childbirth."

The bitterness is in my voice now, and I can see it impacting her, as if it were a physical thing.  As if she could be borne backwards on a wave of my anger.  My chest heaves, and I breathe in harder.  I feel my jaw borne upwards on a wave of sudden, freeing hatred; my chin snaps up and my eyes blaze.

"She's dead.  I never knew her.  I've grown up in an orphanage; I've lived there seventeen years.  All I ever knew about my mother the nuns told me.  She lived just long enough to name me.  Marvolo after my grandfather.  And Tom—" my jaw clenches—"Tom, after _him_."  I practically spit the word as I gesture violently at my father.  "Riddle—after _him."_

"Tom—"  That was from my father.  I whirl around—is he trying to address me?

"Tom Marvolo Riddle."

"That's my name, yes," I say savagely.  He looks at me, really looks at me for the second time.  Then he looks down at the floor, and my throat unaccountably seizes up.  How dare he not look at me?  And how dare he look (after what he put me and my mother through)?

I feel my grandmother's hand on my shoulder.  I shrug it off violently and step back to look at her.  

She seems almost hurt.  Tentatively, she steps forward, looks as if she's going to put a hand to my face.  Fortunately for her, she does not.  I'm vibrating with rage by now (I can feel the magic surging within me).  

"You—"

The wall behind her is painted in a deeper red, now.  Authentically the color of blood.

"Tom—I can tell you're Julia's son."

My father looks at her with interest.  My grandfather buries his face, shaking his head.

"You have her eyes."

I look up at her now, her face bathed in the sun's unnatural glow.  She's lying, and as I meet her gaze she smiles apologetically.  

I don't have my mother's eyes.  I have _her_ eyes.  I take another step back.  

"_I_ can tell you're Julia's son," says my grandfather, looking up again suddenly.  His eyes are beady with hate.  "By pure genetics.  You're both—"

"Hush," says my grandmother simply, and he falls silent again, though grudgingly so.  

I have my grandmother's eyes.  My father's build.  But thank god I don't have anything from my grandfather.  

This is all so unreal, so utterly unlike anything I had imagined.  Those long nights when I stayed awake in my dormitory, plotting the moment when I would kill Tom Riddle; those nights in the past few weeks when I lay in my orphanage bed, the increasing proximity of my seventeenth birthday filling me with a restlessness I could not sleep through.  Unrest, and energy, building up to a climax necessarily world-changing.  It _will_ be.  But here…tonight…I have not lost my anger, and it is for this that I remain sane.

"Tom…" my grandmother begins again, and trails off, watched in every miniscule movement by her son.  I glance at him now, and he meets my gaze quickly before shifting his eyes to the window.  The old woman looks at the floor, and at the old man, before she finally gets around to looking at me again.  And I understand.

She will ask me to live with them.  She must.  Everything in her family consciousness is leading her to ask me, whether her husband wants it (I've come in the past few minutes, however, to doubt his importance in family decision-making), whether her son wants it (so the order of things is giving _him_ the run-around too, in the end), whether _she_ wants it.  

She must ask me.  And the Rules of Family record that I must say "yes."  

"Tom…"

If I don't meet her gaze, I've found she hasn't the strength to finish the sentence.  I'm looking at my father now, at the red-headed brute tracing a seam with his finger.  

"Young man…"

Ah, so I'm "young man" again and not Tom Riddle.  Her voice is gaining back some of its hardness.  Its cold stone strength.  

According to the rules, I must say "yes."  But Lord Voldemort has his own set of rules.

I will not answer.  I will simply kill her.

A hand on my shoulder.  Again?  My father looks up, and in the light I can't tell if he's looking at his mother or at me.  The blood-red sunlight is giving way to a dull orange glow, and it is this glow which hits half my father's face, leaving the rest in shadow.  I shrug off my grandmother's hand.  A more engulfing blackness fills the bottom half of my father's face, and I stop still, watching, heart pounding.

"Tom—" ah, but he has only opened his mouth.  "Son."  

Were I not Lord Voldemort, I would be seriously tempted to retch in the middle of the drawing room.  By what authority does he draw the right to call me "son?"  To even address me?  I've spent four years looking for this bastard, and here I am being interrogated by his snobbish family, being made to look the fool in the middle of their ornate drawing room, interrupting their _tea—or whatever it is that rich snobbish people are up to after dinners—enduring terms of endearment from the man I most hate, as if it were a sentimental moment from the cinema—_

"Tom, will you stay with us?"

"Ha!" I choke out a laugh, my first reaction, my only _possible reaction.  The bastard asks me himself?  It's hilarious!  After all this time spent searching for him, planning to find him, to kill him, plotting revenges until I cried myself to sleep at night from the sheer righteous anger, he __asks me to live with him!  _

"He spits on our hospitality!" cries my father's father, and suddenly he's found something he's allowed to yell about.  I feel the concussion as he leaps to his feet.  "This bastard son of a bitch is laughing at our kindness!  He's trash!  Ashley, throw him out _now, I will not tolerate his like on our premises!"_

My grandmother's hand is absent from my shoulder, and I feel the cold of the room in its place.  The light is gone.  My father's face is in darkness, so I cannot see his reaction.  The bitter taste in my mouth is back.  It's spreading down my throat and to the tips of my fingers.  

"Young man, you'd better leave," says my grandmother simply, and that, _that_, is the breaking point.  How she _dares—_

I am Lord Voldemort now, and so suddenly my movements change.  They're surer now, confident, practiced.  I take a large step toward the window and spin around, so as to frame all of these Muggles in my line of vision.  My wand is out of my pocket before I quite know it and in my hand, vibrating gently to the rhythm of the magic within me (though of course no such rhythm exists).  

Her voice has regained its hardness, the matter-of-fact manner with which she dismissed me as a common peddler.  "Young man—if you're going to be childish—"

"AVADA KEDAVRA!"

A rush of green light, a sudden strobe flash of the room.  My grandmother, frozen in mid-reproof, eyes just glassing over; my father, eyes wide in horror (he knows); my grandfather, seemingly just confused.

She never finished her sentence.

I pause, taking in a deep breath as the magic replenishes.  So silent, so still, this scene I have created.  

My grandfather cuts and runs for the door.  He is down in a flash of green light before his hand even grasps the silver knob.  Lying dead as if he were a runner too exhausted to finish his race.

And now my father.  Tom Riddle.

The silence lapses into long seconds, broken only by the sounds of breathing.  Strained, shallow breaths from him.  Deep, even and measured from me.  We gaze at each other (though the darkness is nearly complete).  

"Well," he says, in a tone at once resigned and accusatory, "what are you waiting for?"

"Your last words."

I hear a low, mirthless chuckle.  He's _laughing_ at me!  

"Who exactly do you think you are?"

"I am Lord Voldemort," I tell him without thinking, and the anger flares throughout my body, from my heart to my arms and my legs.

He chuckles again.  I draw myself up.  He's going to say something else; he's drawing in a breath.  Perhaps a curse against my mother, against me, a plea for mercy—

"Yes, Tom—you're from _my_ family alright."

I draw in a deep breath, his laughter ringing in my ears.  Laughter!  He's mad; he's insane!  What kind of lunatic laughs at his own death?  The sound grates on me, brings the anger within me up in a crescendo until it is nearly unbearable.  

I don't remember actually killing him.  

When the green light fades he is dead, on the carpet, and my wand is hot with use.  I take another deep breath, calming my shaking hand (amazing I could even aim my wand.  But then fate is kind to Lord Voldemort).  

I leave the room, tripping over both my grandmother and my grandfather as I make my way to the ornate glass door.  In the hall I pause, closing the drawing room door behind me, closing in the scene that will greet whichever servant comes in tomorrow morning to tidy up.  The front door is to my right.

I turn to look around me, to look at the wealth hoarded by this family of Muggles.  Tapestries on the walls.  Mirrors with ivory and gold trim.  A glass-and-silver door _indoors, for god's sake.  Various pricey ornaments on the walls.  I step closer to a rack of the knick-knacks, and pick one up in my hand.  It's a gaudy little elf figurine, complete with a plump face and green trousers.  I look around at the others on the shelf: all ugly, kitschy little baubles like this one.  My grandmother's collection, most likely.  I replace the elf and step back, folding my arms around myself to keep out the cold.  The sun has gone down, and I can hear the wind outside whistling, bringing ever closer that bank of clouds in the west.  I turn left and begin walking down the hall, taking note of all the things I pass.  _

Further down the hall I encounter the kitchen, the abode of the darling cook.  My stomach rumbles, and it occurs to me that I have not eaten since morning.  With my wand I quickly make myself a sandwich.  I select a place at their small, shabby kitchen table (the servants, apparently, are the only ones around here who have to settle for less than perfect).  Then I remember the shelf of knick-knacks and I remain still for a few minutes, eating until I have finished my sandwich.

I get up and leave out the hall door.  I walk down the hall, toward the front door, passing with only a brief glance the glass-and-silver passage into the drawing room.  I open the front door with my wand and close and lock it behind me.  The Muggle police investigators will have fun with this one.  

It's raining now.

It's dark, and that cloud bank from the west has apparently set in, though earlier than I'd expected.  I'm not wearing my robes, in my attempt to blend into Muggle society for a time.  I pocket my wand and move out from under the porch awning, folding my arms in front of me to get a little protection from the cold and wet.  My legs are too light.  My arms too.  Despite the cold, I move with so little resistance.

The rain falls around me with a slight pattering sound.  

I turn around and look back at the house from the front yard, finding it barely visible in the darkness.  I wonder if my mother ever stood here and looked up at my father's house the way I am now.  I feel a slight twinge in one hip, as though it were beginning to be arthritic.  Then I turn for the backyard and a few minutes later I melt away into the forest, hearing the murmuring of graveyard spirits in the moving trees.


	3. Epilogue

I'd never planned to come back to this house.  Site of my earliest victory over my past and my blood.  Subject of dreams – nightmares, pleasantries, raving laughter forcing me from sleep to consciousness.  One event in the cacophony of past time that stands out clear, hard but not sharp, throwing childhood and victory into focus.  I cannot deny that there is a certain irony in taking up residence here – an irony I embrace.  Just today I ate dinner in the downstairs parlor.

The same chairs are still in it.

I'd been here since last July at least – June perhaps – time is of little meaning when one has only a rudimentary body.  At first we kept to the upstairs.  It was pleasant, and only once were we disturbed in the months we stayed here.  Yet now, as a human, pacing these halls so familiar and yet so alien, I feel a weight settle upon me.

Perhaps it is the irony of having come here, to Tom Riddle's house, in search of shelter and healing in my hour of need.  I did not think such thoughts before, so consumed was I with merely staying alive.  You have no idea what it is to have to concentrate on living – no idea of what it feels like to labor under the knowledge that the only thing keeping you alive is the concentrating on it.  The body is largely a container for the soul.  Much as a jug is a container for water.  Once the body is broken the waters of the soul and the life-force wash out, disperse, are gone.

Only I, in my dark knowledge of death and immortality, knew what spells to weave, what thoughts to focus upon to keep my meager spirit-waters in one place.  A container of the mind.

Living, having a body, is making me lazy.  Or so I fear.

I wonder what it is like to die.  Is that strange?  I, who hope never to die, who have witnessed more death than most wizards the world over?  Who have _caused_ much of that death?  I nearly died.  And still I don't know what it is – what dying is.  Knowledge is power.  But death is the end.  And if there are limits to knowledge, then power is also limited.

I can't have it both ways, I realize – I'll take the immortality and live on without the knowledge.

I have power enough.  I can feel it within me.  The magic _itself_ moves within me, though to feel it is impossible (doubts dutifully recorded).  The magic has taken over this house, even.  I don't know what it is – the enchanting effects of a triple-murder? – but I know power in this house.  What was once a place that left me feeling exposed, the only solid thing in a world of liquid, clawing at water, is now a place where I feel the dull _thrum_ of life and reverberate with it.

The world is real here.

If only Harry Potter were dead, it might be cause for celebration.

Maybe that's the reason for the heaviness which sets upon me now, which bids me sit down on a bed, rest myself.  I am real; the house is real; the magic is real!  It was always real, you understand, but it was hiding under the illusion of…I cannot explain it.  But Harry Potter is still alive, Dumbledore knows of my return, and my best-laid plans are coming to naught. (My hip hurts too.)

Or perhaps, and I realize the probability much as I might like to deny it – it is being here in the house of my father.  Green-eyed, red-haired brute of a man.  Man dead fifty years, in death donating to his son a bone and with it new life.

I wonder if it was the _left_ leg bone.  My hip hurts so.

No, I'd never planned to come back to this house.  I knew that for the dark spells to work, for me to be brought back to life, I must travel here to perform the needed ceremonies…but once Wormtail, fool as he is, had gotten us back to England we'd ended up here permanently.  Living (or the nearest equivalent).  The house was abandoned, after all, with naught but an old Muggle gardener within a mile of it.

I came here seeking shelter.  I came here seeking life.  I came here seeking…

What a reversal of fortunes has taken place!  In the midst of my ponderings, I cannot help but laugh.  Wealthy Riddles, destitute grandson come to pay a visit…dead Riddles, with a grandson who is now the most powerful wizard in the world.  Irony sweet and lulling.

Lucius visited tonight.  We'll be moving to new quarters soon, I and my Death Eaters will.  We daren't meet here more than a few more times before finding other graveyards to haunt.  But he came, and we ate a cursory dinner in the downstairs parlor.  Wormtail is an able cook when put to task, if not gifted.  Lucius brought news – Dumbledore's conviction that I had returned, the Ministry's denial, the _Daily Prophet_'s campaign of words against Harry Potter and Dumbledore…good news most of it.  I enjoyed especially the notion of Dumbledore looking the fool to the greater Wizarding world – as I have known him to be for decades…

This summer is extraordinarily dry, and not a cloud marred tonight's sunset.  Wormtail scuttered back and forth, bringing food, and, after dinner, tea.  I questioned Lucius, and Lucius answered, and by and by we settled into a pleasant silence.  Lucius looking uncomfortable, me settling back into my chair.  Home at last.

"I do wonder at the décor these Muggles indulge in," said Lucius at last, casting a sneering glance around the parlor.  The sun caught his hair and made it a flame of silver colored red. "Cheap.  Tawdry.  I do wonder how they put up with that door," he said, pointing at the ornate entrance to the room.  His face bore an expression of old-money snobbery. "If this were my house, it would have been gone years ago.  Gold plating, I say, gold is the way indoors." He glanced at me in sudden anxiety. "Not that I am criticizing, my lord – I realize you will be leaving this house soon, that it is not yours…"

I let him trail off, the sun staining his face in blood.  I took another sip of my tea, and found that somehow, in the course of several seconds, it had become old and bitter.


End file.
